{"id":580,"date":"2011-08-18T04:40:08","date_gmt":"2011-08-18T09:40:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=580"},"modified":"2011-08-18T04:40:08","modified_gmt":"2011-08-18T09:40:08","slug":"cd-review-johnnie-taylor-taylored-in-silk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2011\/08\/18\/cd-review-johnnie-taylor-taylored-in-silk\/","title":{"rendered":"CD Review: Johnnie Taylor – Taylored in Silk"},"content":{"rendered":"

Johnnie Taylor<\/strong> is best known for his 1968 Stax hit \u201cWho\u2019s Making Love,\u2019 and nearly as well-remembered for his mid-70s disco hits, including the regrettably-named chart-topper Eargasm<\/em>. But in between those, he made an album that bridged the styles. 1973\u2019s Taylored in Silk<\/em> found the versatile singer serving up eight tracks of, well, silky-smooth soul. The tracks aren\u2019t the most original in their sonic delivery \u2013 the arrangements are quite similar to what one would have found on countless r&b albums of that era \u2013 but Taylor\u2019s assured and earnestly emotional vocals render even the most pedestrian material a few notches higher in quality.<\/p>\n

Thankfully, there\u2019s little in the way of pedestrian songs on Taylored in Silk<\/em>. \u201cStarting All Over again\u201d sounds like a hit, and it was\u2026but for somebody else. The song had been cut in 1972 by Stax labelmates Mel & Tim<\/strong>, and it soared to #4 on the r&b charts. Taylor\u2019s version is effective, and the sweeping strings are a lovely backdrop to his heartfelt delivery. \u201cCheaper to Keep Her\u201d is a bit Vegas-y but fun nonetheless. The low-key, slow jam of \u201cTalk to Me\u201d would make a great background for a romantic scene in a film. \u201cI Believe in You (You Believe in Me)\u201d sounds like a hit as well, with strong echoes of The Staple Singers<\/strong>; perhaps the writers (and\/or arrangers) of the Elton John<\/strong>\/Kiki Dee<\/strong> hit \u201cDon\u2019t Go Breaking My Heart\u201d listened to this track.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s nothing as funky her as \u201cWho\u2019s Making Love,\u201d but then that hit wasn\u2019t representative of the style with which Taylor was most comfortable. But for smooth, radio-ready r&b\/soul of the early 70s variety, Taylored in Silk<\/em> is an exemplar. Neither the rarest nor most easily found of old Stax vinyl records, the album was ripe for remastering and reissue.<\/p>\n

Thanks to Concord <\/a>for doing so in 2011, and appending the relatively brief original running order with a half-dozen bonus tracks. These are the a- and b-sides of three Stax singles Taylor released in 1971-73. A-sides \u201cHijackin\u2019 Love\u201d and \u201cStandin\u2019 in for Jody\u201d both charted on the Billboard<\/em> Hot 100, and as best as I can tell, neither has been issued on CD until now.<\/p>\n

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Bill Dahl<\/strong>\u2019s excellent liner notes are worthy of mention: Dahl wisely spends as much ink putting the singer\u2019s work into larger context as he does addressing the album itself. And with Concord having access to Stax masters, this is no needle-drop reissue: the sound is predictably stellar.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Johnnie Taylor is best known for his 1968 Stax hit \u201cWho\u2019s Making Love,\u2019 and nearly as well-remembered for his mid-70s disco hits, including the regrettably-named chart-topper Eargasm. But in between […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-review","cat-65-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=580"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/580\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}